


On the Matter of Sons

by Deannie



Series: Family Business [2]
Category: The Magnificent Seven (TV)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-05-28
Updated: 2014-06-11
Packaged: 2018-01-26 23:11:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 17,946
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1705979
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Deannie/pseuds/Deannie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Takes place during "The Trial". Obediah has the right of it. Sometimes children don't rightly know what you do for them. And Maude's got more on her mind than just getting out of jail free—after all, it's not the first time she's been falsely accused.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> As with many of my fics, this is a partial novelization (this time, of The Trial), and chunks of the episode (in this case the vast majority of the episode, since it isn't specifically Maude-centric, really) are missing from my tale.
> 
> Also, no one in this story is named Bridget. "Bridget" was a derogatory term for an Irish woman—usually working girls or housekeepers and maids—as Bridget was an extremely common name in Ireland (as was Patrick for a boy, hence the derogatory term "Paddy"—like a Paddy wagon). Calling an Irishman a "Mick" was a common epithet in the US, but actually intimated that the man was a bastard son (a surname starting with O' denoted a legitimate heir, while a surname starting with Mc—"Mick"—denoted an acknowledged but illegitimate child). That said, Mick was a very common nickname for Michael. The Kerry Patch was a section of St. Louis where the Irish settled—it was known for being a rough, filthy, dangerous place, but was actually just like any other tenement anywhere. 
> 
> Pronunciation note: Eilis is pronounced "Eye-lish" or "Ee-lish," depending on where you are in Ireland.

Maude Standish stepped lightly off the stagecoach as it stopped for food and water in a tiny little backwater called Whitsburg, nodding politely to the driver as he helped her down. She looked up and down the town’s one dusty street and sighed, heading for the saloon. God knew she needed a drink.

For once, walking into a saloon did nothing for Maude’s state of mind. This one—she hadn’t bothered to look at the name (probably “Saloon” or something equally unimaginative)—was brightly-lit, a rarity in these parts, and had clean, baize-topped tables on a raised stage to the right of the entrance, with tables for eating to the left. It was so much like the main room of The Running Dog in Kansas City that she found herself looking for the narrow hallway to the left of the bar that should lead to the private poker rooms in the back.

She shook her head. She hadn’t thought of that place in years. She didn’t want to think of it now. Kansas City was nothing but bad luck. The last time she and Ezra had been there, he’d left her in a huff, railing about how she had no “common decency” and ruining a perfectly good con. And ended up in that blighted little town in New Mexico.

Well, damn Ezra and his heroic disposition, anyway. And damn Michael Standish for passing it on to the boy. And damn Chris Larabee and his band of merry men for fostering it, while she was at it.

Ezra was angry about the whole Standish Tavern affair—she could understand that. She had _hoped_ he’d be embarrassed and hurt enough by his failure and his friends’ betrayals to leave Four Corners entirely, but no. Pity. God knew she’d spent enough time thinking on that con that it should have borne _some_ sweet fruit. At least her saloon in Four Corners was flourishing now—she’d gotten some profit out of it.

She shouldn’t have had to run the damn con at all. When she’d visited the dusty little hole in the ground after that fiasco with the O’Malleys (and how on earth was she supposed to have known that that snivelling little toad Cornelius Kirby was a cousin of theirs?), she had had an inkling that perhaps her son might be getting too comfortable in his role as “fine, upstanding citizen”. She’d made it clear he needed to move on before he got irretrievably ensnared, and she’d’ve thought he’d understand that.

She’d feigned great amusement when a companion had produced a copy of Jock Steele’s horrible little pulp novel about the Magnificent Seven a couple of months later, talking about the similarities between her son and the heart-of-gold gambler in the story. She’d assured him that Ezra would never be caught dead in such a situation, but in truth, the story of seven men “joined by destiny” had worried her. Ezra shouldn’t be joined to anyone and destiny was for suckers—among whom her son should never be counted.

So it was with a great sigh of relief that she received his telegram the next month that stated simply, _My time in Four Corners is at an end. Headed for Frisco._

It was the next telegram—not a week later—that had her figuring out how best to sever her son’s ties with destiny: _Back home in Four Corners. Long story. Only mildly amusing._

 _Home._  Home _in Four Corners._  

Damn him.

So she’d had to hit him where it hurt—that endless dream of his “very own saloon” he’d been harping on since he was in short pants. She’d set out to make him realize once and for all that his dreams were nothing but that, and that friends were only as trustworthy as the value they saw in you. Man sees a better horse, he’ll hop off the nag, her daddy used to say.

And still her son stayed in the damn place, going nowhere. He’d clearly forgotten everything she’d ever taught him. A mother’s work laid to waste.

 

“Care for a drink, lady?”

The coarse offer shook her from her thoughts and Maude gave the filthy man a haughty sniff. “I think I can acquire my own libations, sir, thank you.”

The man snorted, taking no offense as his friends chuckled at him and Maude moved on toward the bar.

She’d expected Ezra to come around eventually. He always did. He’d pout for a while, sulking in that vulnerable little boy lost way he had, then they’d take right back up where they’d left off.

“Figure they’s the best—can’t imagine why no one’d want to go up against ‘em.”

She simply couldn't understand why he hadn't answered her last two letters. He never held a grudge for long—not against _her_. Maude motioned for the bartender to bring her a whiskey and eavesdropped absently on the table where the dirty man who’d propositioned her sat, still musing to herself. She should not be having to work cons on her own flesh and blood. He should have listened to her in the first place.

“I hear it was some kind of revenge thing,” another of the men said. “They come all the way from Kansas City just to kill him.”

She shook her head. _Kansas City. Nothing but trouble._

“Guess they threatened to kill ‘em all. Got real het up.” The man who’d offered her the drink downed his own. “Larabee and his gang sure showed them.” He laughed. “Guess them Nichols is heading back to Missouri a few boys short.”

Maude stopped cold. Oh God, no.

“Guess their ma was some Irish spitfire. Would’ve got ‘em all killed if she could’ve.”

> _“If I find you’d anything to do with this, Mary Stiles, I’ll see to it you do nothing else. You hear me?”_

“Just goes to show you how vicious them Irish really are! Guy they was after was Irish, too, I hear.” The other man waved his hand as his friends nodded and he took a long draught of his beer. “Not right off the boat or nothing, but his daddy was one of ‘em. Got the end he deserved, I figure. And she just packed up the sons she had left, neat as you please, once they’d killed him.”

It took several long seconds and another whiskey before Maude could compose herself enough to head for the table, a contrite look covering the dread in her heart.

“I do apologize, sir,” she offered demurely, standing beside the man she’d brushed off earlier. “I fear too many days on that awful stage have left me frightfully rude.”

He smiled. Least he had all his teeth, she thought inanely. She’d worked with worse. “I’m willing to forgive you, darling,” he told her. “If you give me your name.”

“Maude Stanton, at your service, sir,” she replied with a smile of her own.

“Well, Miss Maude,” he said, kicking the chair beside him out from under the table. “I’d be right honored for you to take a ‘libation’ with me.”

She sat down and slid her valise under her chair, smiling coquettishly. “Why thank you, kind sir. I believe I spy a bottle of brandy at the bar. I do so love a good brandy.”

The friend who’d made the crack about Irishmen getting what they deserve laughed at the crestfallen look on the man’s face. “Didn’t think she’d ask for a half-dollar drink, did you, Clem?” he chuckled.

Clem looked at Maude, who batted her eyes. “Hell, boys, I figure a drink with a beautiful lady like her’s more than worth it.” He headed off to the bar to procure her drink, and Maude studied the other men at the table. Ranchers, probably. Hard-working and hard-playing. Gossips, every one. She could tell just by looking at them that they’d be good for some information and a little cash.

And, while she never turned down a coin, information was what she desperately needed. She’d never considered that Ezra wasn’t writing to her because he couldn’t.

> _“Not right off the boat or nothing, but his daddy was one of ‘em. Got the end he deserved, I figure.”_

He was crafty, her Ezra, and his friends were a resourceful bunch, too, but she’d witnessed first-hand how bloodthirsty and thorough the Nichols clan could be when collecting on a debt. Maggie had “purified” her boys after Jack went to jail, making them swear off loose women and drink and gambling. She’d shut down the Running Dog—Maude had even heard she’d considered burning it to the ground—and concentrated her sons on the family’s more above-board ice delivery business. Or so she wanted people to think.

It hadn’t made them any less a nest of vipers—Maggie perhaps the worst of them.

“Here you go, Miss Maude.” The rancher placed a small snifter of brandy before her. “Now,” he asked, watching her sip delicately. “What else should we do—’sides drink expensive booze?”

Maude pulled on years of training and grinned, sliding a deck of cards out of her skirts and willing her hands not to shake. “I feel a need to limber up my fingers after such a long ride,” she said, shuffling expertly. “My rheumatism, you know?” She watched the men around her light up in the face of the new and different experience of playing poker with the fairer sex. She did love being a woman sometimes.

“Now, would anyone care for a game of chance?”

 

* * * * * * *

 

> It’s all set. My boys will be there tomorrow. You could sell it to me for real? Come back to Denver. WMackley

Will Mackley was a lifesaver, as always. She really should marry him one of these days—if only to save herself from the Preston Wingos of the world.

Last night’s terror had dissolved quickly as she plied those men for information, and Maude chose not to dwell on the coincidence of Maggie and her boys being anywhere near her son. Maggie couldn’t have known about Ezra, after all. “Mary Stiles” had been dead and gone for more than twenty years, and she’d certainly never had a child.

It was a coincidence. Nothing more. And Maude ignored as many of those as she could, so she wouldn’t think about how dangerous they could be.

By the accounts of the rancher Clem and his friends, Four Corners still had seven able-bodied protectors and the southern dandy who plied his trade at the Standish Tavern was in fine fettle and had cleaned them out as thoroughly as she was doing. As she’d expected, Inez seemed to be in his back pocket; the men were under the impression he either managed or outright owned the place.

It was time to forget about the past and deal with the present, clearly.

She had to find a way to do away with the hurt and bitterness Ezra was holding on to as a result of her latest lesson. He couldn’t continue to ignore her—she was his mother, for God’s sake. She’d been trying to teach him something.

If only he’d actually learned the _lesson_ in the lesson, she thought angrily, instead of pouting like a child.

Well, there was nothing for it but to clean up the mess and move on. Will’s men would be in Four Corners tomorrow morning; her “potential investors,” intent on buying up her hot property and leaving the same day. In reality, of course, nothing would change—the papers would be worthless—but it would symbolically remove the Tavern as a wall between her and her son.

She just hoped it would placate him. She had a feeling that Four Corners had changed her boy more than it should have. Before that town, Ezra would have shrugged off his hurt eventually. He’d’ve moved on to greener, or at least different, pastures, and eventually they’d’ve fallen back in together. It was a cycle, and one Maude found soothing in its own way.

“Next stop, Four Corners!”

As the stage got under way, she tried hard not to consider the possibility that that cycle might be broken now. Of course not, she told herself firmly, taking out her deck of cards and shuffling to calm herself. You’re his mother. He’ll always come back, because you’ll always come back.

> Eighteen months had never felt so long, and Maude was on her last legs by the time she knocked on the door to Pat and Eilis’s new apartment. Slightly larger than the tenement where Maude had left her son those long months ago, the place showed that Pat was trying to claw his way out of the Kerry Patch and make something of himself. Maude promised herself that once she was back on her feet, she’d send them money to help. She’d make amends.
> 
> She wasn’t sure she could make amends to Ezra. She couldn’t imagine what it must have been like for him here.
> 
> “Maude.” Eilis greeted her coldly, though her gaze softened once she really took her visitor in. Maude knew she was thinner. She was definitely paler. She felt and looked like a shadow of herself, but the cough and the weakness had finally left her and she’d primped as well as she could so that Ezra wouldn’t ask questions she wasn’t prepared to answer.
> 
> “He’s been a good boy,” Eilis finally said, fetching water from the drink bucket and gesturing for her sister-in-law to take a seat on the couch.
> 
> Maude smiled wanly and sipped the tepid liquid. “Of course he has,” she said quietly. “He’s his father’s son.”
> 
> “I didn’t tell him you were coming. Didn’t want to get his hopes up.”
> 
> Maude knew she deserved it, but the barb still stung. “Is he here?” God, all she wanted was to see her son. She didn’t think she’d ever missed him quite this much before.
> 
> “He’s out for a ramble with Mick and Kate. Lord knows where he’s taken them to.” Eilis turned back to the stove. “They’re to be home any time now.”
> 
> “Thank you, Eilis,” Maude offered quietly, watching the younger woman stop her preparations without turning to face her. Listening without accepting. “I know I had no right to expect you to take him in like that, but believe me when I say I truly had no choice.”
> 
> Eilis sighed. “There’s always a choice, Maude, my dear,” she said sadly, going back to her cooking. “He’s settled in well here,” she continued in a careful voice, still not bothering to face her. “He’s got nearly a home, now.”
> 
> Maude bristled. “Ezra is _my_ son, Eilis.” She did not endure the last year and a half to have someone try to take him away from her again.
> 
> “Aye. He is.” Eilis turned green eyes like her brother's on the woman he’d once loved. “Remember that the next time you do… whatever it is you do these days.”
> 
> These eighteen months had worn Maude down. She couldn’t hold back her tears, and she was too tired to try for the likes of a sister-in-law who would never understand what her life entailed.
> 
> “Oy, Mam!” A little boy ran in the door and Maude had the absurd idea that it was Ezra calling out to Eilis for a moment. “Will you look what Ezra got!” The moment was gone as an exquisite young girl walked in, ushered by a thin boy with Michael’s hair and eyes and broad, self-satisfied smile.
> 
> “Aunt Eilis!” the boy called, the southern drawl blunted a bit by months in the company of a thick Kerry brogue. “We managed to procure some eggs for you.”
> 
> The young boy—no, not young any more. Not at all—froze as he spied Maude in the parlor. And for him, she could stop the tears and give a warm, impossibly eager smile. Lord, how she’d missed him. “Hello, Darling!”
> 
> “Mother?” he asked, a mixture of elation, anger, hurt, and fear in his eyes that floored her for a moment. “You came?”
> 
> “I’ll always come back, my baby boy,” she whispered, as he walked quietly toward her out-stretched arms and let her enfold him in a fervent hug he half-heartedly returned. “I’ll always come back.”

“Four Corners! Water stop and drop!”

Maude looked out the window to survey the twilit town. Mr. Tanner stood on the porch of the jail, looking as rustic and dangerous as he ever had. Mr. Larabee stood next to him; less rustic, more dangerous.

“Mrs. Standish?” the stage driver held out a hand to her and she realized she was somehow the last one out. “Where would you like your bags to go, ma’am?”

It took her a minute to find her voice as she saw Mr. Larabee watching her far too closely. “I believe I have a suite waiting for me at the Ritz,” she said quietly, holding tight to her valise as if it were a talisman against the cold gaze the gunslinger was casting her way.

“I’ll see your bags are there when you get there, ma’am.”

She smiled absently and dipped her head in gratitude. “Thank you so much.”

If she was hoping that Larabee would be content to glare, she was sorely mistaken. He nodded to Mr. Tanner and headed toward her.

“Maude,” he greeted her coolly. “Didn’t expect you back.” His gaze became more dangerous, a warning she knew she’d do well to heed. She realized she was sweating and resented it deeply. “Ezra know you were coming?”

She pulled her dignity around her, playing the game of outraged ignorance that had saved her life a few times, now. “I honestly hadn’t thought I’d need to inform him beforehand. I didn’t just come to see my son, sir,” she replied blithely. “If you’ll remember, I do have a business venture in the area that needs to be tended to.”

The grin he gave her was downright feral. “Oh, I remember.” He looked over toward the lights of Standish Tavern, which was full to the brim and pleasantly noisy in the twilight. “Might want to be careful while you’re ‘tending to things’.”

He stalked off into the evening , leaving her seething. How dare he pretend that _he_ was the one to look after Ezra’s interests? She had been looking out for her son his entire life—teaching him everything he needed to survive in this thankless, pitiless world!

Angier and far less trepidatious than she had been, Maude made her way to her saloon, pushing open the doors and surveying the place as if checking up on her investment. What she saw actually caused her to pause a moment and smile.

The Standish Tavern was thriving. Truly. Clean and bright, with a lively atmosphere and smiling staff and clientele. Perhaps she really should sell the place—Inez had done wonders.

The woman in question caught Maude’s eyes and wound her way through the tables, a slight frown between her eyebrows and a frozen smile on her face.

“Senora Standish,” she greeted her coolly. “I didn’t think to see you so soon.”

Maude sighed. Well, it wasn’t as if she expected a warm welcome, was it? “I am here, my dear, to survey my investment and hopefully introduce it to its new owners.”

That threw the little spitfire, she thought with a shark’s smile. Inez stepped back in shock. “New owners, Senora?” she asked carefully.

Maude gave her a comforting pat on the shoulder. “Oh don’t worry, my dear, I’ll make sure it’s in the contract that you remain as the Tavern’s manager.” She gave the young lady a sincere look of approval. “They’d be fools to part with you anyway.”

She scanned the games in play, weeding out the ones that wouldn’t be worth her son’s time, searching for a familiar head of hair.

“Senor Standish is at the clinic,” Inez supplied helpfully.

Maude jumped in surprise and tried to school her features to blandness, but she knew Inez was watching her too closely to miss the worry.

“One of the children took a tumble this afternoon and broke his leg,” the saloon manager explained blithely. Maude swore the girl did it simply to torture her. “Senor Ezra is kindly watching over him while his parents ride into town to fetch him.”

Maude sighed. Clearly Ezra and Nathan had mended fences. Who knew her Southern boy would finally learn the lesson of tolerance she’d spent a lifetime trying to teach—and at just the wrong moment. Oh, and her son’s weakness for waifs would do him out of untold riches one day.

“Well then, I’ll just have to see him when he returns to his room later tonight,” she said, scoping out the largest pot to start with.

“Oh, Senor Standish does not live here anymore, Senora,” Inez told her, a bite to the proclamation.

Maude shook her head in surprise. “Well, whyever not?”

Inez’s face was inscrutable, but her eyes were fiery. “I cannot say, Senora,” she said coldly. “But perhaps he will reconsider with the change in ownership.” She bowed shortly and took her leave.

Lord, would these people never learn to take a lesson in the spirit that it was intended?

Sadly, while many people were playing, few were betting enough to make it worth her while. Maude spied Buck Wilmington and headed for his table instead, where he sat playing cards with the young sheriff. He was the most forgiving of the lot of them. Perhaps she’d get an idea of the lay of the land from him.

“Hello, boys,” she called, sliding gracefully into an empty chair.

True to form, Buck sat up straighter, while Sheriff Dunne ducked his head. The child really did have to learn to either not get played or not feel guilty about it afterward.

“Well, hi, Mrs. Standish.” JD greeted her politely enough, but there was a worry in his eyes, as if he expected fireworks at any moment. “We, uh. We didn’t expect to see you so soon.”

She sighed. “So everyone keeps telling me.”

“Ezra know you’re here?” Buck asked, a trifle coldly.

Maude bristled again. Good lord, did they think they had to protect him from his own _mother_?

“I have found a buyer for this lovely saloon,” she said, pointedly not answering the question and putting excitement and satisfaction in her voice when she felt none. “They’ll be here in the morning and I wanted to assure myself that the property will show to its best advantage.”

JD was crestfallen. “You’re selling?” he asked sadly. “I guess, well..." He took a deep breath. “We were kind of hoping maybe you’d, you know, sell it back to Ezra. You know, since he learned his lesson, and all?”

Maude shook her head at the child’s naivete. Ezra hadn’t learned any damn lesson at all.

“A woman must make a profit, Mr. Dunne,” she said blithely, ignoring the sour look on Buck’s face.

“I hear you all had some excitement with the Nichols family?” she threw out, not even aware she was going to bring it up. She wasn’t dwelling on the past today, right?

Buck’s eyes darkened dangerously and she wondered how well he’d known Chris Larabee’s father-in-law. She held her breath until JD piped up, energetic as always.

“Yeah, it was really something, Mrs. Standish,” he told her. “They came into town in this armored carriage. That was a heck of a sight!”

Maude kept an ear to JD’s prattle, but her mind was back in Kansas City. She wondered which of the sons had come up with the armor idea. John, she expected. She'd heard he'd turned out to be his father’s son—crafty and cold.

“Swore they’d kill him and everyone who helped him, so of course, we had to.”

Of course they did, she thought angrily. They didn’t want to live to a ripe old age, after all, did they?

“And then they asked him where they could find Chris. I guess he spun them a heck of a tale, because they took off just like he told them to.”

Maude froze, replaying the boy’s words and realizing he was talking about her son. “I'm so sorry, could you say that again?”

JD missed the warning in her tone. “Yeah, Ezra said he gave them fake directions to delay them enough to get Hank out of here. And they fell for it. Can you believe that?”

“No,” she gritted angrily. “I really cannot.” Ezra could _not_ be idiot enough to go up against that clan of monsters! Had her son lost every shred of self-protective instinct he had in this godforsaken town?!

Buck must surely have seen the steam coming out of her ears, for he put a quelling hand on JD’s arm. “Now, JD,” he said quietly. “I’m sure Mrs. Standish doesn’t need to hear all about that little old dust-up.”

“No, I’m quite sure she doesn’t. Mother does so hate unpleasantness.”

It was one of the few times Ezra had ever caught her unawares, and Maude was on her feet in an instant, glaring at him. She noticed Larabee and Josiah enter and watch her from the doorway, but she couldn’t pay them any mind.

“Going up against the Nichols brothers, Ezra?” she hissed. “Have you gone _completely_ mad?”

He kept his bland exterior admirably, but she could see her fear had surprised him for a moment before he remembered he was angry with her. “I and my friends were able to handle the problem, Mother,” he said finally. “It _is_ what we do.”

“It is?” she asked meanly. “I thought you wanted to be a bartender. Or something.”

Her son’s expression shut down and a corner of her mind berated her for throwing that particular hatchet. Hadn’t she been coming here to bury it?

“Well, you have done your best to show me the errors of pursuing that fanciful little dream, now, haven’t you, Mother?” He slipped past her, dropping lightly into the seat next to Buck and nodding his thanks at the full shot glass that greeted him. “So tell me, why, exactly, are you here?”

 _Why indeed?_ she asked herself.

“She’s going to sell the saloon.” Lord, someone needed to get a muzzle for that child.

Maude watched Ezra glance over at JD and knock back his drink with cold deliberation before he turned to her and smiled. She shivered at it.

“Well, well,” he drawled. “I do hope you turn a tidy profit on the place, Mother.” He rose stiffly. “I’d love to stay, but the poker profits look hardly worth my time at the moment. I believe I shall head... elsewhere.”

Maude watched her boy walk out, proud of the dignity with which he left.

“Thought I told you to be careful with your tending, Maude.”

She took a deep breath and ignored the cold, angry tone as she was again caught unawares, this time by Chris Larabee sauntering up behind her. Ezra was _her_ son. She wouldn’t have the likes of these ruffians dictating to her how best to handle him. With a smile, she turned to face Larabee and tightened her grip on her valise.

“Gentlemen, I believe I shall go over to the Ritz and get myself settled.” She started to walk out, ignoring the look Josiah was giving her—it was sad and disappointed and altogether not at all the misplaced affection he used to show her.

She stopped cold at the doors to find Vin Tanner holding them for her. His eyes were sad as well.

Lord, did they think they were some band of brothers?

“Hope your business don’t take too long,” he murmured in that laconic way of his. “Things was just getting back to normal 'round here.”

She didn’t bother to answer. Just walked out the doors and across the street.

Yes, damn Chris Larabee and his merry men. Every last one of them.

> “But Mother, examinations aren’t until next month. Did something happen?”
> 
> Maude had looked at her slight, impossibly quick-witted eight-year-old son and sighed. Even if she wanted to explain to him, she had no idea how to do it. She knew Lafayette and his men were watching. She couldn’t escape herself—but she could get Ezra out.
> 
> “I just think it’s time to be moving on, Darling,” she said tightly, heading for the train, sensing men following not-too-close behind. “St. Louis is lovely.”
> 
> Ezra was silent until they were safe in their small compartment and awaiting the whistle.
> 
> “You aren’t coming.”
> 
> Maude had closed her eyes a moment at the statement. When he was younger, it had always been a question. She plastered on her best mother’s smile and spun the con.
> 
> “I have had a wonderful opportunity fall into my lap, Ezra,” she scolded. “It could put you into St. Finbar’s all the way to university, if we play our cards right.” She almost choked on that particular lie, but it was a fitting carrot to dangle before him. Ezra did so long to be one of the educated. “But there’s sadly—”
> 
> “No place for a young boy in it,” he finished flatly. After a long, bitter moment of silence, he asked, “Who am I staying with?”
> 
> “One of your father’s sisters.” At least she hoped Eilis would take him in. She hadn’t been allowed to send word to her.
> 
> He made a face and she couldn’t fault him for it. Few of Michael’s family members had thought much of her—as an in-law or a mother. Luckily, though, they’d all loved Michael enough to care for his son when needed.
> 
> And God, was it needed now.
> 
> “Will there be a school?” he asked quietly.
> 
> Maude sighed. “Ezra, I don’t—”
> 
> “Never mind,” he ground out, clearly wondering why he bothered to ask. “I brought my books.” He stared out the window and ignored her as the train got underway.
> 
> He’d forgive her—he always did. He just didn’t always understand that she was doing what was best for him. Now more than ever.

The Standish Tavern did a thriving lunch business these days, which surprised Maude slightly. Inez had obviously had the right idea about serving food to compete with the two small restaurants in town.

Will’s men were waiting for her at the bar, playing their roles to perfection, taking notes and planning for the future of their enterprise.

She smiled at Inez, who was just arriving from the rooms upstairs. “Inez, these are Mr. Layton and Mr. Brown. Sirs, this is Inez Recillios, the woman responsible for the Standish Tavern’s success.” She watched Inez blush in spite of herself. “Let me just give you boys a tour, shall I?”

She walked them around the ground floor, watching JD Dunne enter with a sad look in his eyes and gesture to Inez for coffee. She ignored him completely, surprised that the child should care one way or another about the deposition of the establishment. Surely he didn’t think Ezra was still hanging on to his foolish dream, did he?

She lead the men up the stairs and was surprised to see her son exiting one of the rooms, settling those guns of his. It wasn’t the room he’d been renting when she was here last.

She wondered vaguely if it was Inez’s. That was a truly charming thought. If he was going to insist on remaining here, he could do worse than the beautiful Mexican girl.

“Mother,” he drawled pleasantly. She was again impressed with his poker face. Lord, he could have cleaned up in San Francisco or Chicago. Whatever did he think he was doing here? “I take it these are your new investors?”

Mr. Brown looked at Maude questioningly, although she was well aware that he knew exactly who Ezra was. Will always sent the best.

“Excuse me, Mr. Brown, Mr. Layton. This is my son, Ezra.” She smiled mockingly at her boy. “He’s a member of the local law enforcement.”

“Really?” Mr. Layton said, whistling appreciatively. “Well now, that does make the offer even more enticing, doesn’t it?”

She could see the shark in Ezra’s eyes, and secretly cheered it. “That all depends on you, Mr. … Layton, was it?” He grinned as the man nodded. “The law here isn’t too accepting of, shall we say ‘less than reputable’ establishments. I do hope the Standish Tavern’s _new_ owners don’t run afoul of Mr. Larabee.” He shook his head sadly. “He can be quite... cantankerous... when people cause trouble in his town.”

Maude almost smiled as Mr. Layton nearly forgot his part in the con and blanched. “ _Chris_ Larabee?”

“Oh yes,” Ezra drawled with a smile. “Mr. Larabee is frightfully devoted to the safety of our little community.” Her son really was a shining star, wasn’t he?

“Well, we certainly don’t plan any trouble here, Mr. Standish,” Mr. Brown broke in smoothly. “We just want to run a fair and reputable business.”

Maude was certain that the look Ezra gave her could have melted iron. “What a novel idea.” He looked away from her pointedly and tipped his hat to the men beside her. “Gentlemen.”

Brown waited a moment, listening to Ezra reach the bottom of the stairs and greet Inez, before he whistled. “Will wasn’t kidding. What _did_ you do to get your son so angry with you?”

Maude sighed. “Some children just cannot stand to be taught a lesson, my friends.” She looked up and down the hallway and sighed. I believe we should go ahead and finish this charade, shall we?”

_Perhaps then he’ll cease to insist on being such a child about this whole thing._

  
* * * * * * *

  
“Now, you'll have to forgive the appearance,” Ezra said not an hour later, gleefully ushering his _own mother_ into a jail cell, “but the maid quit.”

Unbelievable! Maude was nearly speechless. “How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is to have a thankless child,” she spat at him. And to think, she’d been concerned for him!?

“I'm cruel only that I may be kind, mother,” he said mildly, causing gorge to rise in Maude’s throat. “After all, you should know better than to steal. You know, perhaps some time spent behind bars will be... instructional.”

She froze for a moment, as the words threw her back to another time and another jail, before snapping out of it. “Preston Wingo put those cufflinks in my bag,” she averred. Surely Ezra could see that?  “He's blackmailing me.”

The look of disbelief on Ezra’s face made her want to spit. “Now, why on Earth would he want to do that?”

Oh no. No, she wouldn’t give him the satisfaction. “That's none of your business.”

Buck Wilmington’s lankiness lounged into the doorway. “Come on. Judge wants us to ride.”

Of course he did. And Ezra was just going to jump to and do as ordered. After all she’d done to try to teach him the truth about the world... Ezra turned to her with a smile. “Well… sleep tight,” he said, grinning at the filth she was thrown into. “Don't let the, uh…” he looked at the bed with a smile. “You know the rest.”

The outer cell door clanged shut and Maude growled as he walked out the door, closing it quietly behind him.

She couldn’t believe it! Preston—that little snake! And now Ezra! _OH!_

Maude paced as she fumed. He _locked her up_ —her own son and he locked her up like a common thief! Her hand drifted to her hair, seeking out a pin to work with. He had to know that, while she didn’t have his facility with a pick, she knew her way around locks well enough to get herself out of here and away before he and his friends ever returned from wherever their little judge had sent them.

She paused suddenly, two fingers gently holding a metal clip still mired in her braid. Oh no. No, that was exactly what the horrible little boy wanted, wasn’t it? She’d bet he was just waiting for her to break out so that he could catch her and put her away again for escape. It would be just like him.

Oh, that child could be so... _childish!_

She took her hands from her hair and smoothed down her petticoats. She’d stay right here. Here, alone, in this filthy little cell...

Well, no. Not filthy. She had to admit it was cleaner than that hovel they’d thrown her into in Kansas City.

Lord, he wasn’t really going to leave her here alone, was he?

> “Maybe some time behind bars will teach you something, Bridget.”
> 
> The cell in Kansas City was small, dirty, and full. They hadn’t even let her wash her hands and the blood on them had dried and now itched horribly. She didn’t trust the tub of “clean” water in the corner, and to be fair, the blood on her skin and clothes did serve to warn the other women away.
> 
> No one spoke to her—only two spoke at all, and that to each other—and all of the other women looked as tired and scared and frozen through as she felt.
> 
> Throughout the day, one by one, names were called and women departed, bound for whatever their fates were.
> 
> As the sun set, Maude stood alone in the middle of the cell, unwilling to sit on the cots for fear of whatever might be living in them. Ezra would be sitting down to a fine meal at his school now, she thought, and the thought made her realize she hadn’t eaten since early yesterday evening.
> 
> What would happen to him while she languished here? Good Lord, what if they believed she’d done it? She was innocent—of _this_ she was innocent. She guessed that her fear should be less that they’d believe it and more that they’d hang her anyway, to hide the truth.
> 
> What would her son do if she never came to get him? She always came back—he trusted that.
> 
> What if, this time, she didn’t?

“Maude?”

She startled, taking a deep breath to drive the remembered terror away.

Mary Travis stood in the middle of the jail’s office, looking concerned. Maude wondered if the young lady had been calling a while.

“Mrs. Travis,” she greeted her, banishing the fear and relief from her voice with an effort. “As you can see, your good deed has certainly not gone unrewarded.”

She regretted the sharp tone immediately, as the widow’s gaze fell. “I am sorry, Maude,” she said quietly. “I didn’t realize he’d—”

“No, dear, of course you didn’t,” Maude broke in, saving herself from the woman’s bumbling apology. And it wasn’t really the girl’s fault anyway. “I’m sorry. My son’s traitorous actions have left me a tad unsettled.” She smiled wrily. “And being unsettled makes me less than lady-like, sometimes.”

The widow smiled. She really was a lovely girl. Smart, too. Maude knew herself that that could be a wonderful combination, if used correctly.

“Can I get you anything? Something to eat?” Mary shrugged helplessly. “I just hate to see you so uncomfortable.”

Maude thought about it. Thought about how far she could push this. Mary Travis was feeling guilty about her part in this and confused about why Ezra would do such a horrible thing to his own mother. Maude could certainly make hay on that.

“Truth be told, I feel rather bereft without my own things,” she continued quietly. “I haven’t even had a chance to freshen up after the heat of the day.” She sighed. “And I am _ravenous_.”

Mary grinned. “I can get you lunch from the restaurant. And I’m certain the sheriff wouldn’t mind if I retrieved your belongings from the hotel,” she said after a moment. “I’m sure once everything is figured out, you’ll be able to move right back there.”

Maude snorted delicately. “You clearly don’t know my son very well. Ezra can drag things out until you’re like to die from the waiting.”

The woman on the other side of the bars nodded, and a faint look of disapproval came into her eyes. “Ezra was pretty upset the last time you were here,” she replied thoughtfully.

Time to nip that sympathy in the bud and divert attention. “And he can hold a grudge as well as his father,” Maude laughed, mother-to-mother. She affected a shiver—not so hard, given her memories of Missouri—and sighed again. “These bars are just so awful—so confining! If I could just do something to... to pretend that they weren’t there!”

Mrs. Travis thought a moment, forgetting to side with Ezra. “Maybe we could put some lace or curtains up?”

Maude shook her head in mock approval and camaraderie. Some marks were just too easy.

“My dear, you read my mind.”

  
* * * * * * *

_to be continued..._


	2. Chapter 2

By the time Nathan walked into the jail hours later, carefully escorting an older Negro gentleman, Maude had the cell set up to her own exacting standards and had banished Kansas City completely from her mind.

“Can I have a cell like that?” The old man’s question dissolved into a weak, wet cough. Oh dear, he was ill. Lord, she did hope Ezra’s fit of pique didn’t land her in some hospital somewhere. Though that *would* teach him a lesson.

“Miz Maude,” Nathan greeted, nodding to her. Such a polite young man. At least one of the seven of them was!

She moved to drop the black lace curtain she’d erected between her own cell and the next and smiled. “Nathan.”

“Ma'am,” the older man offered. She supposed, looking at him, that he really wasn’t that much older than she was. He’d had a very hard life, though, clearly. She smiled pleasantly at him too, before dropping the curtain and allowing him and herself their separate privacies.

“I'll get you some blankets, make it real comfortable for you,” Nathan was saying, quite eagerly and with great concern.

Well, just because she couldn’t see them didn’t mean she couldn’t hear. She wasn’t really eavesdropping, after all. Just a consequence of shared incarceration.

The prisoner let out a tearing, exhausting cough that reminded Maude again of another prison and another time. Lord, would she never get Kansas City out of her mind!?

“Daddy?” Maude froze at the child-like worry in Nathan’s voice. “Daddy, are you all right?”

Good lord, poor Nathan!

“Fine. I'm fine,” Nathan’s father lied. Pride soaked his breathless words. “Look at you. Grown into a fine man. After I knew you'd made it north, I used to dream about you... living as a free man.”

“Well, Daddy, you didn't have to stay.” Maude could hear a tinge of resentment in Nathan’s tone, and wondered at it. “You could've come with me.”

“I would've slowed you down.”

Maude found herself nodding behind the black lace. Well, of course he would have. He’d clearly done whatever he could to ensure his child’s safety—she’d done the same herself for Ezra when she needed to. What parent wouldn’t?

Nathan just as clearly didn’t see it that way. He and Ezra had more in common than they thought. “You, uh...you want some supper?”  
“After a while,” his father replied. It was obvious he didn’t want to be a bother. To his own _son_ —parents were meant to be a bother! Children, too.

“All right,” Nathan replied. Maude wondered if his father realized the young man was furious with him.

Maude wondered why he was.

Nathan’s father coughed violently for a long minute after his son left and took another moment to recover before Maude could see the lace-blocked shadow of him pull something out of his pocket and attach it to the bars between their cells.

She put down her needlepoint and lifted the curtain to see him painstakingly braiding strings together.

“What _are_  you doing with all that string?” she asked quietly. He looked so sad and broken. She remembered the same look from some of those women farther gone than her during the influenza in Kansas City. Remembered how much their decline had terrified her, reminding her that she might well be next.

“Keeps my mind busy,” he said. He was from Georgia. Maybe Alabama. Nathan’s own accent had been blunted by years away, as had her own son’s, but this man’s place in the South was clear. “What's a white lady doing in jail?”

She felt her righteous indignation rise again and welcomed the distraction from her own dark thoughts. “My own son locked me up!”

She’d somehow expected much more surprise from him than she got, though she realized suddenly that he was in the same boat, really. Instead he braided his strings and said, philosophically, “Sometimes they don't rightly appreciate what you do for 'em.”

Maude nodded. “Truer words were never spoken.”

As if on cue, her own thankless offspring bounced into the jailhouse, bursting out laughing at her as he approached. “Well, well,” he said, unlocking the outer holding area door and looking into her cell. “My, my,” he went on, fingering the lace at the top of the door and grabbing on to the bars there. “ You know, it's a touch baroque, but I like what you've done with the place.”

“What do you want?” she growled, aware that Nathan’s father was watching. She supposed he must think his own son a saint compared to hers.

“Perhaps I could be persuaded to act as your advocate,” Ezra said.

Was he insane!? “You? You're the one who had me locked up.”

He nodded imperceptibly. “I don't find your story..." he pretended to grope for words, finally coming up with, “compellingly truthful.”

“Well, I don't care what you think,” she replied, drawing on her dignity. “I know I am innocent.” _Of_  this, _I’m innocent._

He pretended to think about it, though she knew he’d already made up his mind. In fact, she figured even if he _did_  think she was innocent, he’d let her hang for it anyway.

She suppressed a shudder at her thoughts, shoving old fears away. She wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of seeing her rattled.

“All right, suit yourself,” he told her, a devil’s smile on his lips. “Holler if you change your mind.”

His spiteful laughter echoed in the dim jail even after he’d gone.

“Reckon your son don’t rightly appreciate much about you, do he, ma’am?”

There was a rueful smile in the weary call from the next cell, and Maude found herself glad she could put it there, no matter the cost. The poor thing didn’t seem like he’d seen much to smile about for a very long time.

She turned back to the lace curtain, tying it more securely to the top of the bars so that she and Nathan’s father had a clear view of each other. Privacy meant little when you shared a bond of parenthood.

“Maude Standish, at your service,” she said quietly, holding out her hand.

He smiled shyly and reached out carefully to shake it. “Obediah Jackson, ma’am,” he introduced himself. “Pleased to make your acquaintance.”

 

The rest of the day was spent surprisingly amicably, considering the surroundings. Obediah was a quiet man and, aside from a short visit by Nathan to provide him a more comfortable sleeping surface, plus a delivery of food for both of them from the lovely restaurant at the hotel, he worked away on his relentless braiding while Maude continued her needlepoint.

They spoke only briefly, and she learned he had indeed lived in Georgia and then in Alabama. He offered little else, and she glossed over anything more than her own upbringing in Charleston and affection for New Orleans. A man’s past—especially one as painful as Obediah’s obviously was—was his own, and Maude left him to it.

She worked her cards for a while, cursing silently at the inevitable stiffening of aging joints. She hadn’t made her life as a gambler for years, and she supposed she wouldn’t really be up to the job full time anymore—not as any long term solution. Truth was, she should be allowing someone like Preston to take care of expenses and provide her a life of leisure in her waning years, but she just couldn’t hold still that long. Certainly not for a clinging fop like him.

And she found, to her horror, that she missed having a husband that she actually cared for. She hadn’t had that in nearly thirty years. Well, there had been dear Aces, back in Mississippi, but the poor man hadn’t really lived long enough for her to convince him to marry her. Noble fool—that was where nobility got you....

_The years have made you maudlin, Maude Harriet,_ she chastised herself.

Buck Wilmington opened the outer door in the growing twilight, and smiled kindly at her. How sad that a simple cowboy should show her more compassion than her own child.

“Miss Maude, Mr. Jackson?” For a moment, he juggled the trays he held, before wisely settling them both on the desk and opening the cell doors.

“Now, don’t go getting any ideas, Maude,” he joked as he left the bars open to go retrieve the tray carrying her meal. “Can’t have you escaping on me, now can I?”

“I would never dream of it, Mr. Wilmington,” she assured him archly, accepting the tray he offered. “I am completely innocent here. I only wish to be exonerated.”

Mr. Wilmington gave her a slightly cold glance. “I don’t think anybody’s ever accused you of being _completely_  innocent, Maude.”

She huffed delicately. They were like a pack of foxes, those seven, rallying round each other and nipping at everyone else’s heels.

“Nathan said you were to drink this all up, Mr. Jackson,” Buck said nervously. He’d obviously noticed Nathan’s absence as much as the man’s poor father had. “Said he’d be by soon as he could to get a proper look at your lungs.”

Obediah seemed pitifully resigned. “I expect he’s real busy, taking care of all the folk hereabouts.”

Buck had the decency to blush and refuse to credit the lie.

“I’ll be right outside on the porch, if anyone needs anything.”

 

Obediah had just dropped off to an exhausted sleep, still hacking away in his pitiful fashion, when Maude heard a voice outside that turned her cold.

“Ah, my reputation has preceded me. Happy to hear that,” came a self-important, satisfied voice from the street.

Dear God, he must have left Snellville nearly the moment she did, to get to Four Corners already. Probably had the telegram written up before he even stuffed the damn cufflinks in her bag.

Preston Wingo, the little toad, stood before her suddenly, with that simpering smile on his face. Ezra entered directly after, and his expression was just as bad, mocking and bitterly amused.

“Ohh... Maudie. Oh, Maudie, light of my life!” Preston gushed.

“You skunk!” she ground out.

“You're a beautiful woman, Maudie. And even more beautiful when there's fire in your eyes.”

Oh no, he wasn’t going to get at her that way. “You put those cufflinks in my bag, didn't you? Admit it.”

He just tipped his head to the side, all but confessing to it right there. “Say the word, Maudie, and I'll set you free.”

Free to be his love slave, forever being fawned over in that gilded cage of his. “Huh! Never!”

“When as in silk my Maudie goes—”

Oh dear Lord, not the poetry again! “Don't try to sweet-talk me!”

“Oh, then methinks how sweetly flows…”

Shut up, shut up! “You tell these people I didn't take your cufflinks! And get me out of here!”

“The liquefaction of her clothes. Then when I cast my eyes and see…”

Did he have to pick *this* one?! “Quit it! I hate that poem!”

“That brave vibration each way free…”

She cast a pleading look at her child. Surely he wouldn’t make her endure such torture? “Ezra, make him leave!”

“Oh, no,” he said, spiteful wretch! “This is...

“Oh, how that glittering...”

“This is beautiful!”

Abandoned to this horror by her own child! She clapped her hands to her ears, drowning out that final hated phrase with a cry of sheer torment. “God, I can't bear it!”

“Maudie? I've substituted your lovely name for Julia's.” Well, of course he had—man hadn’t an original thought in his head. “I--I don't think Robert Herrick would've minded, hmm?”

Herrick was no doubt turning in his ever-loving _grave!_

“Get out.” He wasn’t going to blackmail her like this. He could go straight to Hell.

“If I can't have you, Maudie, then the jailer can.” She looked up in shock at the statement, and was gratified to see the look of surprise and worry on Ezra’s face for a second before he returned to his mocking.

Preston was, as usual, enchanted by her show of contempt. “Ha ha ha! Hot-blooded! Passionate!” Her tormentors shared a look. “What a woman! Maudie,” Preston reached out a hand to her in leaving. If he’d been closer and she’d had a knife…

Then thankfully, blessedly, he was gone.

“My, my,” Ezra said, worrying his lip with his thumb in that way he had when he was thinking his way out of a trap. He saw the con here, good... “I don't know how you managed to resist such a display of ardor.”

She turned away. She was not going to say one word.

“He reminds me a bit of that railroad man in Pennsylvania…”

“Morgan,” she sighed, despite herself. Preston was much... grabbier... but yes, they were similar.

“Mother, whatever could he have had that you so needed? You don’t normally allow yourself to be saddled with men like him.”

“Preston Wingo is a very wealthy man, Ezra,” she told him, facing him and gathering her dignity around her. “It would have been a nice little con if it wasn’t for his..." she looked for a term and came up with Ezra’s. “...ardor.”

Her son came closer, genuine worry surfacing for the first time. “He’s not the type to let go, Mother. Surely you saw that to begin with?”

Yes, yes she had. A bit. But she hadn’t had much choice at the time. “Sometimes the rewards outweigh the risks.”

“I thought you were doing well for yourself now,” he said, twisting the knife he didn’t even know he was holding. “Will Mackley told me the con in Denver went off without a hitch. And with the profits from the Standish Tavern, surely—”

“The Standish Tavern?” she mocked coldly, suddenly fed up with seeing the worry and the hurt and the amusement all in those eyes so like Michael’s. “Why do you think I sold the damn place? The Standish Tavern didn’t even make enough profit to…” She tried to think of a comparison and came up with the dirtiest one she could find. “To keep _you_  happy.”

The worry fled, and the amusement, replaced by cold anger. His voice dropped to a mere whisper.

“Oh rest assured... it would have kept me happy, Mother.”

And he was gone, pointedly _not_  slamming the door behind him.

“Well, that went well,” she murmured to herself. She looked over to where Obediah was sleeping the sleep of the exhausted, glad he hadn’t awoken to witness her humiliation. “Be glad your son doesn’t have the mean streak mine does,” she murmured to him.

She looked at the chair and at her needlepoint on it and sighed. She couldn’t face anything but a bed now, too tired from the confrontations and her worry to bother to do more than put out the lamps and lay on the dusty cot.

At least this one was softer than that horrible palette in Kansas City. She lay in the moonlight, failing to banish that prison from her mind, for nearly two hours before a soft moan in the cell beside hers had her sitting up.

“Hannie!”

Obediah’s voice was high and rough and terrified, his illness robbing his cries of their no-doubt-desired volume.

“Oh, Hannie! No! No, you can’t take her— _Nathan_!”

The cot on the other side of the bars shifted violently and suddenly Obediah was sitting up and coughing, shaking the entire bed.

Maude rose almost silently and put her hands to the iron that separated them.

“I believe Mr. Larabee is outside,” she said quietly, watching with a worried frown as Obediah didn’t even jump, just glanced up at her and continued his hacking. “Shall I call him and have him fetch Nathan?”

The poor man shook his head vehemently. “No,” he gasped. “No, I’m all right.” He tried to control his breathing. “I’ll be all right. No need to bother him.”

Maude stood watch all the same, sighing as he shuffled across the cell and took a deep draught of water from the drinking bucket by the door. When Obediah had made it back to his cot and settled sitting up, she couldn’t stop herself from asking the question that had been on her mind since Nathan brought his father in. He was just too calm. She knew from experience what it was like to be falsely accused, but she didn’t think that was the case here.

“Did you kill that man?”

Obediah jerked an angry look at her, but it wilted as he could see she had no menace behind the words. People could be pushed to horrible things, as she well knew.

“My sins is between me and God, Miss Maude,” he told her quietly. “He the one who’s gonna decide what my fate is.”

She nodded. God was the only one who could, after all, no matter what people thought of their own importance in the process.

“Is Nathan your only child?” she threw out, hoping to divert his thoughts—and her own.

Obediah smiled proudly and shook his head. “Got me five strong girls, too,” he told her, his gaze falling quickly to the floor. “Least I did. Don’t rightly know where two of ‘em are. They was young when they went north. Scattered.”

“You must have been so happy to see Nathan.”

Obediah’s face drew down into sadness. “Shouldn’t’ve come looking for him. He don’t need this pain. Ain’t nothing fair in this for him.” His next words were whispered and she almost missed them. “Still, he deserves to know the truth... afore I go.”

“He loves you,” she said. Because she didn’t really know how to respond to his words. And because, Nathan’s anger aside, she could see it was true.

He smiled in the darkness. “Don’t make no difference, Miss Maude,” he told her plainly, sliding down to lay on the cot. “They can love you all they want and you can love them, but it don’t mean you can always keep ‘em safe, do it?”

His eyes closed and he drifted off into another restless sleep.

Maude sighed, heading back to her own bunk. “Truer words, Mr. Jackson...”

> She’d finally succumbed to exhaustion by the second evening and dropped down on the cot, praying she’d wake unmolested by whatever insects infested it. She was roused harshly by the ring of a billy club against the bars at dawn.
> 
> “Up, Mary Stiles!” called the burly officer who’d initially apprehended her. “There’s someone who’d like to talk to you.”
> 
> Inspector Lafayette was short and rotund and should have been laughable—except that he had a far-too-shrewd look in his eyes and a knowing smile on his face. He waved the officer out and closed and locked the door behind him. Maude began to shake, despite herself.
> 
> “Mary Stiles, eh?” he asked quietly, taking a seat across the table from her. “From Kerry?”
> 
> “Yes, sir,” she whispered, terrified.
> 
> “You were caught running from the scene of a murder. Covered in blood.”
> 
> She looked down at the blood still dry on her skirts. “Sir, I—”
> 
> “You knew Margaret O’Herlihy, yes?” He smiled. “I hear tell you and she didn’t get along.”
> 
> “But that doesn’t mean I killed her,” Maude finally got out, anger at the false accusation suddenly overriding her sense. “It’s absurd. I’m no more a murderess than... than _you_  are!”
> 
> “I know you’re not, Mrs. Standish,” he said, using her real name and scaring her all the more. He let the truth he’d spoken hang between them for far too long before he spoke again. “But I know you know who did it.”
> 
> Maude drew on every inch of her poise and experience to maintain her poker face. “My name, sir, is Stiles,” she said, accent thick as Irish grass. “Mary Stiles. And I am sure I have no idea what you think you’re talking about.”
> 
> The man sat down. “So then you wouldn’t know a young student at St. Finbar’s named Ezra, then?” Maude’s blood ran cold. Dear God, what had they done? “He goes by Ezra Stanton, of course—are you sure the two of you should be using different aliases? He looks a lot younger than the ten years he’s supposed to be according to his records. Child that young could slip up so easily.” He tapped a finger on the table. “Could get a boy hurt.”
> 
> Maude didn’t even try to bluff this time. Not with Ezra on the line. “What do you want, Inspector?” she asked, dropping the fake accent. “And how do you know who I am?”
> 
> LaFayette shook his head. “Can’t go revealing my sources, can I?”
> 
> “What do you want?” she repeated. God, where was Ezra? Did they have him?
> 
> “Jack Nichols.” He leaned toward her and she managed to stop herself from physically retreating. “We know he did the killing. And given your current standing at the Running Dog, I doubt that’s the only thing you’ve seen.”
> 
> Maude shook her head. In the six months she’d been running her scams out of the Irishman’s saloon, she’d seen more evil than she’d ever wanted to from Jack Nichols. But she was damned if she’d invite it on herself. “I am not that stupid, sir. _If_  I knew anything about Jack Nichols and his activities, I would be courting my own death to speak of them.”
> 
> “We could make sure your deposition was private,” LaFayette assured her. “You and the judge in a room.”
> 
> “An impartial judge?” she snorted painfully. “In Kansas City?”
> 
> “He’s a circuit judge from St. Louis,” the inspector told her. “Name’s Larkspur. Young and hungry and ready to start cleaning up the racketeers.”
> 
> Maude hung her head. God, she was tired. They’d had her locked up here without food for nearly two days, and she was glad she’d been able to scam enough to keep Ezra lodging at St. Finbar’s.
> 
> If he was still there.
> 
> *Oh, darling. What am I going to do?*
> 
> “What interest does a St. Louis judge have in a Mick from Kansas City?” she wanted to know.
> 
> “Nichols has been killing people for a long time, Mrs. Standish. Not just in Kansas City.” He opened the file that had sat on the table since Maude had arrived. “He was double-crossed by a business associate in St. Charles two years ago. Killed the man and his entire family in retribution.”
> 
> She was going to be sick. “You are not doing anything to make me feel secure about opening up to you, sir.” _God, Ezra._ “What exactly do you think he would do to me and my son if he found out I told you anything?”
> 
> “As far as I know, Ezra Stanton has no family in the area,” LaFayette told her mildly. “His mother is a coal heiress of some sort—lives back East. Rarely visits.” He sat back and she allowed herself to breathe. “There’s no reason for him to know about your son.”
> 
> “There was no reason for _you_ to know about him, either,” she pointed out, trying to calm herself further. How the hell did this man even know who she was? She’d never worked in Kansas City before!
> 
> LaFayette inclined his head in agreement. “I have friends in New Orleans,” he admitted. “You obviously didn’t notice Gerald Morrisey at the Running Dog last week, but he noticed you.”
> 
> Of course. Lieutenant Morrisey had been instrumental in running Maude out of New Orleans last year. He’d never forget her after the chase she’d led him on.
> 
> “We can make sure Nichols doesn’t know anything about Mary Stiles’s involvement,” he assured her.
> 
> “How?” she demanded. She was trapped and she knew it and all she could think of was how to get Ezra out of this alive. If Jack found out she fingered him for Margaret’s death, he’d come after all she held sacred first, and let her watch it burn before he killed her, too. “There were only so many of us there. How could you possibly make him think that I wasn’t the one who told you?”
> 
> “Because you go to jail for the killing.”
> 
> Maude stopped breathing again and had to force herself to inhale as spots danced before her eyes. “How in God’s name does that help me?”
> 
> LaFayette leaned forward. “We don’t have to get Jack Nichols on murder charges to send him away. I expect you’re more than aware of the other activities Jack has going on.” He smiled. “And the fact that you have no involvement in his activities short of giving him a cut of your winnings at the table makes you a much safer bet for us than others might be.”
> 
> Maude swallowed the bile in her throat. She was indeed aware of Jack’s many depravities, but that didn’t mean she was willing to hang to bring them to light. Nobility—no matter how well she might pretend to it when needed—was simply not in her nature.
> 
> No. There had to be a way out…
> 
> “I won’t say a word unless you can assure me I won’t hang.”
> 
> LaFayette smiled a shark’s smile. “You won’t even go to trial—a bench hearing will find you guilty of assault leading to accidental death.”
> 
> “How long?” she asked. She’d done a short stint in jail a couple of years ago. It hadn’t been unbearable. “And what of Ezra—I can’t keep his… arrangement… going from a jail yard.”
> 
> “Six months,” he assured her. “And Ezra can be remanded to the local orphanage—”
> 
> “No.” No. She wouldn’t do that. He was _her_  son!
> 
> LaFayette looked at her with that mild, placid look she wanted to slap off his face.
> 
> “I decide where Ezra goes.” St. Louis wasn’t far, after all. But hopefully far enough from Jack’s influence…. “I’ll need to deliver him myself.”
> 
> He laughed, as she knew he would. “You honestly think I’m going to turn you loose? What’s to stop you from hopping the next train west and disappearing?”
> 
> “Ezra,” she said simply. She would not risk him, and LaFayette could see it. “The only way you will get word one from me, sir, is if I am assured of my son’s safety before I speak.”
> 
> God, this was unfair! She’d only just gotten to a point here in Missouri where she could keep Ezra with her! She’d settled him in here, was going to try to move back to Baton Rouge or Savannah after his school year....
> 
> “Mrs. Standish, you don’t seem to understand,” he said, leaning forward and folding his hands before him. “You testify with the judge and I’ll give you the six months. You don’t, and I send you in for life for murder.”
> 
> “No one will believe I murdered that woman,” she cried. “Any judge—”
> 
> “An impartial judge?” he parrotted back. “In Kansas City?”
> 
> She drew on every bit of grit her father had ever damned her for.
> 
> “No, sir, you will not win on this one,” she grated viciously. “I decide where my son goes, or I will not only testify to Jack Nichols and his myriad depravities, but to the ham-fisted tactics of a police inspector set on to destroying the life of an eight-year-old boy.” She grunted her satisfaction as he blinked. “I wonder what your young, hungry, justice-minded judge would have to say about that.”
> 
> The man’s eyes lit briefly with something like admiration. “Fine. Tell us where to send your son. We’ll arrange it,” he agreed reluctantly.
> 
> She shook her head and repeated her demand. “I will take care of Ezra myself. Once he’s safe with family, I’ll speak to your judge.” She smiled her own cold, crafty smile. “And I’d like to stack the deck a little more in my own favor when it comes to Jack Nichols, if you don’t mind.”
> 
> He nodded after a moment, as if sensing a kindred spirit. “Okay. What’s your plan?”

Dawn came too slowly, and Maude was glad to have it drag her from her dreams. Lord, of all the times for Kansas City to rear its ugly head. Obediah woke coughing, and she rose fluidly to stand by the bars.

“Today you get your day in court,” she said quietly. “I hope it’s worth it to you.”

“Ain’t nothing more important than the truth, Miss Maude,” he replied.

Lord, philosophical to the end. Life and liberty were a bit above the truth in her estimation—but her truth had, she guessed, never been terribly pleasant.

It didn’t seem Obediah’s had been, either, though.

Maude’s thoughts were diverted by the jail door opening to admit Sheriff Dunne and Mrs. Potter.

The widow followed the young man to the bars and waited for the cells to be opened. “I’ve brought you both some breakfast,” she told them sweetly. “Mr. Jackson, your son gave me a powder to mix with your coffee.” She wrinkled her nose. “I do hope it doesn’t ruin the taste too awfully much.”

Obediah seemed to grow a foot in pride at the reminder of his son’s standing as the local healer. “I’m sure it’ll be right fine, Mrs. Potter.” He looked at the mudune tray of bacon, eggs, and potatoes as if he’d never eaten the like. “Right fine.”

Maude thanked the woman demurely and waited for her to leave before she picked up the delicate cup on her own tray. Lord, the brew was awful!

“Anything I can get you two?” Sheriff Dunne asked eagerly.

“Aside from my freedom?” Maude muttered to herself, the sound covered by Obediah’s more politic response: “No, son, I think I gots all I need right here for now.”

Dunne tipped his hat with a grin. “Judge’ll be here in a couple of hours, Obediah. I expect he’ll want to talk to you, too, Mrs. Standish.”

The judge. Well, he couldn’t be totally immune to her charms, could he? She looked around her, deciding which dress would look most innocent.

“Well then, I had better finish my breakfast and get myself ready for the day.” She graced the boy with her most earnest face. “Do you think it would be possible for me to acquire a bath? I would so hate to meet my adjudicator in such a sad state.”

He blushed, as she’d known he would. “Reckon I could ask Mrs. Travis if she’d watch you.” He gave her a dubious look. “You wouldn’t try nothing on her would you? The judge’d be real sore if we let you escape.”

She raised her hand. “I promise, I wish only to freshen up properly, Mr. Dunne.”

He grinned. “I’ll talk to Chris,” he promised, and made his way out.

Maude ate her breakfast quickly, her mind working on a way out—and trying not to dwell on the past that didn’t seem to want to let her go these days.

Well, she’d talked her way out of Jack Nichols’ clutches, hadn’t she? She could surely talk herself out of *this* one.

> Maude “slipped by” her captors as they escorted her to the bath house to freshen up. She ran, terrified, through the back alleys (making sure she was seen by a few select Nichols enforcers) and slipped in the kitchen door at the Running Dog,walking past five dumbfounded staff members before slipping into Jack Nichols’ office.
> 
> “Mary, what are you doing here?” There was anger on Jack’s face, but Maude saw a touch of fear, as well. He hadn’t thought she’d had it in her to escape the police, she could see.
> 
> And of course, she hadn’t. But she had it in her to play him. Courage, Maude, she urged herself silently. Courage.
> 
> “I slipped past them as soon as I could—I need to leave, Jack,” she’d implored him, Michael’s Irish lilt in her voice. “You see that. They truly think I did it—if they catch me again, I’ll hang!”
> 
> The head of the Nichols clan and the most powerful Irishman in Kansas City just stared at her, uncaring, and her blood ran cold. He really would sell out anyone. Anyone who wasn’t family.
> 
> “Mary, you know they aren’t going to hang the likes of you,” he told her. “For God’s sake, you’re nothing but a Kerry girl on the shady side of the street—and so was Margaret.” He all but spat, telling her exactly what he thought of the disposable women around him.
> 
> Maude’s fake brogue broadened. “Sure, that’s exactly the reason they’d do it! Who’s to stand up for a Bridget like me? Killer or no, I make a handy example for them, if nothing else.” She swallowed, forcing the con for all it was worth. “I didn’t kill her, Jack, and you to know that.”
> 
> Maude held her breath, knowing she had too good a chance of ending up like Margaret. But two dead women in as many weeks was too much for even him to sweep under the rug, and she could see he knew it.
> 
> After a long moment, Jack nodded, turning to the safe behind him and pulling out a stack of money. “You’ll keep your mouth shut, Mary Stiles,” he told her, his voice alone promising violence beyond her imagining if she crossed him. He handed over sixty dollars to speed her on her way and buy her silence. “Now go. And I don’t want to see you here in the city again, you understand?”

She really should have heeded his advice and kept on running.

“Maude?”

She shook herself and banished the cold murderer’s eyes from her memory as best she could. Mary Travis stood in front of her, looking concerned but wary. Maude gathered her change of clothes and her traveling purse and smiled at her escort. “I thank you so much for this, Mary,” she said quietly. “I would hate to meet the judge looking such a sight!”

Mary smiled as Sheriff Dunne unlocked the cell and ushered the two women out of the building. They were allowed to walk themselves to the bath house, but Maude noticed Vin Tanner keeping a lazy eye on them.

“I’m sure my father-in-law has seen much worse in his time on the bench,” Mary assured her.

Maude smiled slyly as they headed into the bath house. “Your father-in-law? Really?” She hooked a hand into Mary’s elbow. “Tell me, truly: what’s he really like?”

Information was sometimes more precious than coin, after all, she thought to herself. Sometimes, it could even buy you freedom.

 

 


	3. Chapter 3

Maude had just settled herself back in her cell, arranging her skirts just so and picking up her needlepoint to reinforce her innocent and nonviolent status, when Josiah came in, dressed in a way she supposed he found “respectable,” and sat down lightly next to Obediah.

“Your name: Obediah,” he began without preamble. He did have the perfect voice for a courtroom, didn’t he? “Obediah was a prophet of God. He predicted the downfall of the Edomites. The Edomites were an arrogant people. They felt they were better than everybody else. They tried to destroy Obediah's people, but—”

“It didn't work,” Obediah broke in, a finality and certainty to his voice that rang clear. “Obediah's people rose up. Justice was served.”

Maude was surprised at Josiah’s pause, as if he knew this would not go the way Nathan wanted it. So few things with parents ever did. “Anything you want to tell me before we go to trial?”

Obediah stuck to his guns, and Maude felt a pang that she wouldn’t be in the courtroom to hear his truth for him. “No, Sir. This Obediah just wants his day in court.”

Josiah paused again, and Maude saw his face as he rose. Poor thing knew Obediah had killed that man—and damned if the preacher didn’t feel a sense of peace about it.

It really was a shame he was a pauper.

“You tell a story like that, Josiah,” she told him quietly, “and you'll do just fine.”

The look he turned on her was not what she’d expected, and she took a moment to recover herself at the sad disappointment there. She didn’t even notice the judge arriving until she heard Ezra’s familiar drawl.

“Josiah,” he greeted. “So... you have any biblical parables on hand for unrepentant grifters?”

Josiah didn’t even look back at her. “Nope.”

Maude sighed and tried to look as innocent as possible.

“Someone here to see you, Mother,” Ezra announced. It was strange, watching him, how he showed this judge such deference. He’d never had much time for judges and lawmen before he met these fine, upstanding men...

“Mrs. Standish, I presume? I'm Judge Travis.”

Travis was at least handsome, for his age, which was perhaps ten years her senior. She’d worked with older, though, and certainly with uglier, and she gave him an interested smile.

“My goodness, you're even more impressive than your reputation.”

She ignored Ezra’s roll of his eyes as Travis blinked. “Yeah?” he answered, a little too bored for her taste. “Well, my daughter-in-law believes that Mr. Wingo's charges may be false. I want to know why Mr. Wingo would cause his property to be discovered on you.”

Maude had calculatedly explained Preston’s interest in her to Mary Travis. Clearly the widow hadn’t passed everything along to her father-in-law. And Maude wasn’t sure she wanted Ezra to know it all. It wouldn’t do to show weakness in front of him. A mother needed to be strong before her child. Especially when that child was cold-blooded enough to use it against you.

“Well?” Ezra prompted.

“What will happen to me if I'm found guilty?” she asked the judge earnestly. She needed to know the lay of the land. If it was a simple case of a fine and the return of the cufflinks, she could certainly do that.

Travis’s eyes narrowed. “Are you saying the charges are true?” he asked coldly.

“Definitely not!” she stated, indignation rising again.

The judge was one of those no-nonsense types. He reminded her of Larkspur, damn it. “Madam, get yourself in hand,” he barked, casting a serious look at poor Obediah. She had the grace to be slightly chagrined. “Mr. Jackson is going on trial for murder. I don't have any time for horseplay. Mr. Wingo is adamant that you stole his property, and you are equally adamant that you did not. I want to know the truth, and I want to know it quickly.”

Damn. She looked to her son. He was worrying his lip again. Surely he could see the need to step in here? “Ezra, are you acting as my attorney or not?” she finally demanded.

His gaze was concerned, but laced with too much bitterness for what had recently come between them. Damn that tavern anyway! “Not so long as you leave me in the dark.”

The judge had had enough. “Ezra, you take care of this,” he demanded, Maude marveling at the trust he showed her gambler of a son. “I’ve got a trial to convene.” He touched the brim of his hat and nodded to Maude. “Good day.”

She was desperate not to be trapped here suddenly. “My, my, my, Judge,” she gushed, less carefully than she would normally. She damned herself for her desperation. “You are the handsomest man I've ever met. Hasn't anybody ever told you that?”

Travis looked at her for a long moment and grinned slightly. “Well, you're the first prisoner.” He nodded to Ezra and walked out, leaving her dumbfounded.

Ezra worried that damn lip of his. “Mother, I believe you’re slipping.”

“Get out,” she barked, nearly growling as he did just that, but with that worried, bitter calculation still in his eyes. Thankless child! After all she’d done for him in his life!

She turned back to her cell and froze as Obediah caught her eye. She dredged up a smile. “I expect my problems seem quite petty compared to the enormity of your trial, Obediah,” she offered, stepping close to the bars.

“Ain’t nothing petty ‘bout a parent and child fighting, Miss Maude,” he said quietly. “Reckon that’s near the most serious thing can be dealt with.”

She had nothing to say to that, of course. She and Ezra rarely fought, but it seemed as if all they’d done since Kansas City WAS fight, or dance around fighting. Lord, that last day after the Macklin fiasco had been the worst.

> “Mother,” he’d said, cold as ice and bitter. “I honestly don’t care what you’re going to do now.” He’d drawn himself up, proud of the fact that he’d ruined a con that could have set them both up for at least a few good years. “I refuse to destroy a young woman’s sanity simply for the sake of money.”
> 
> “Well aren’t you suddenly the moral, upstanding one,” she’d sneered. Sophia Macklin was hardly a child—she was at least seventeen—and she might be a shrinking violet, but this might just strengthen the girl’s delicate sensibilities. “I don’t recall you being too proud to bed that Russian aristocrat—what was her name? Natasha?”
> 
> He’d turned on her. “That was entirely different, Mother, as you are well aware. Natasha was a grown woman! This… child…” He’d been so earnest, and she remembered being so angered by that. “What will she do when she finds out it was all a con?”
> 
> “Be the poorer for it?” she’d offered matter of factly. “Learn a lesson, perhaps?”
> 
> “Mother, sometimes your heartlessness disturbs even me.”
> 
> The disappointment with which he’d said the words burned her and she lashed out. “Well, Lord knows you haven’t done much to gladden _my_ heart in this life, Ezra!” She’d seen the hurt in his eyes and reveled in it. “Why don’t you go see if you can find yourself some puppy to rescue or some damn, noble thing.”

And he’d left. For two months she’d heard nothing from him, and she’d worried, burying it in another new con, this time back in Georgia, where her luck had always been more reliable. She’d raked in a tidy profit and was just getting ready to make her getaway when she’d received that first letter from Four Corners.

Damn this backwater!

The jail’s door opened quietly and Nathan and Josiah stepped in, heading for Obediah’s cell. Maude took a deep breath, compassion unexpectedly welling in her. The poor man.

Yet when he looked at her with a small smile on his face, there was peace in his eyes, as if he knew that today a great weight would be lifted from him. And again, she wished she was able to sit in that courtroom and hear it.

“Miss Maude,” he said, dipping his head to her, but carrying himself with a weary shadow of the same pride his son displayed.

“Good luck, Obediah,” she replied. Her gaze went to Josiah, who barely nodded to her, and Nathan, who bristled with worry and anger and a shame in his father that it almost hurt to see. How could a child be ashamed of a parent who obviously loved him so much—who clearly harbored a secret that Maude suspected had been kept only for his son’s safety?

Children just couldn’t see what parents did for them. It was a common failing, and one she and Obediah both knew too well.

Josiah gave her one last fatalistic look as they left, and she returned it with a reassuring smile. Obediah would be all right. At least he might have a righteous day in court. More than she'd had...

> Richard B. Larkspur was not what Maude expected. When LaFayette called him “young and hungry” she didn’t expect the portly forty year old before her. She was quite certain he’d never been hungry a day in his life.
> 
> Still, he looked her up and down with a deep intensity that disturbed her slightly. She reminded herself that Pat and Eilis would take care of Ezra. It was only six months, after all. She could certainly charm him down to less…
> 
> “Mrs. Standish,” he told her sincerely, “I want to thank you for agreeing to talk to me. We’ve been trying to stop Jack Nichols for a very long time now, and with your help, I think we can do that.”
> 
> Maude batted her eyes, trying to seem both appalled by Jack’s crimes and eager to help. “Whatever I can do, of course, Judge Larkspur,” she purred.
> 
> He blinked in surprise and took a moment to compose himself.
> 
> “Yes, well… Let’s just discuss what you know of Mr. Nichols’ dealings out of of Running Dog, then.”
> 
> The discussion was long and Maude was detailed, warming to her subject as she felt a touch of satisfaction, knowing she would be instrumental in putting that cretin behind bars. At the end of it, Maude was handed over to a court officer and led to the hearing room. The judge walked in moments later, sitting and banging his gavel. Besides herself, the judge, and the bailiff, only Inspector LaFayette was present. Larkspur sat forward, ready to pronounce the sentence they’d agreed upon.
> 
> “Mary Stiles,” he intoned, using her alias so that the record of the proceedings would have no mention of her real name. “In the death of Margaret Mary O’Herlihy, I find you guilty of aggravated assault leading to death. You are hereby sentenced to eighteen months—”
> 
> “WHAT!?” Maude launched herself out of her seat. “That—that’s—”
> 
> _Oh God, eighteen months!? She couldn’t do that!_
> 
> Larkspur banged his gavel and leveled an implacable glare at her. Maude’s heart stopped for just a moment, as she knew she wasn’t getting out of it, and she turned to fix her gaze on LaFayette. He looked shocked, but clearly wasn’t coming to her defense any time soon.
> 
> “The defendant will be seated. And silent.” Larkspur continued. “Eighteen months to be served in the women’s prison at Kansas City. The defendant will be delivered there without delay.”
> 
> Maude fought to draw breath as she was pulled back to her feet and escorted from the room. She barely heard the bailiff’s attempt to calm her.
> 
> “Won’t be so bad, Miss Stiles,” he murmured. “I hear tell the Union Hotel ain’t so bad.”
> 
> _God. Oh God, how could he DO this? They had a deal, damn it!_
> 
> “I’m sorry, Maude. I didn’t know..."
> 
> She looked up in confusion, seeing only LaFayette standing beside her. She had no memory of being led into the antechamber, or of the discussion that must have occurred between LaFayette and the bailiff to cause the other man to leave her transport to the conniving police inspector.
> 
> “You _promised_  me—” she began, and cut herself off just as abruptly. It didn’t matter now. She’d seen on Larkspur’s face that he wouldn’t be budged and she cursed herself the fool for allowing herself to be so snowed by him. At least she’d gotten Ezra out...
> 
> “Larkspur,” she whispered, searching LaFayette’s face. “Does he know everything?”
> 
> “Your son, you mean?” LaFayette understood immediately. If Larkspur was willing to welsh on one term of their agreement, there was no telling how far he’d go. The inspector shook his head. “I only told him you were willing to turn evidence. Your son should be safe.”
> 
> Maude’s heart ached. Safe. St. Louis wasn’t any safer than Kansas City, really, was it? Pat and Eilis would protect him—even care for him in their own way.
> 
> _Eighteen months!?_
> 
> She startled as LaFayette took her arm. “We have to go, Maude.”
> 
> And so began what was, arguably, sixteen of the worst months of her life.

Maude shook off the memory as Ezra came striding in the jail, Preston Wingo trailing behind him like a fat old hound dog. She turned her back on both of them. She’d endured that horrible place in a vain attempt to keep her young boy from having to spend his life on the run and just _look_  how he repaid her!

The cell door opened and still she refused to face him.

“All right, Moth—” he corrected himself, which was fine with her. She didn’t particularly _want_ to be know as his mother right at this moment. “Ma'am, I brought Mr. Wingo, and we're all going to sit down and work this out.”

She snorted painfully. “Over my dead body!”

True to his bitter form, Ezra muttered, “That can be arranged.” She pulled out of his grip as he tried to lead her. “Come along.”

Preston was all simpering and mewling. Why had she ever thought she could survive the mistress con with him? “Oh, good day, beautiful Maudie.”

She had nothing to lose now, and simply couldn’t stand the sight of him. “You corpulent cockroach!”

“That's enough,” Ezra told her, treating her like she was five. “Now, you claim Mr. Wingo put those cufflinks in your bag. True?”

There was no margin in dissembling now. “He put them there so I'd agree to marry him.”

That stopped her churlish offspring a moment. She thrilled inwardly at the touch of filial obligation she heard in his voice. “Blackmail, Mr. Wingo?”

Preston was a horrible liar. “No, no. She stole 'em.” As if anyone would believe that. “I just said that if she'd marry me, I'd agree to forget the whole thing.”

_Oh, good Lord!_ “Preston, I don't want to marry you,” she blurted out, patience a cold memory.

“Why, Maudie?” he asked, sounding truly surprised. “You know I love you.”

Sadly, she did know that. She cursed that little bit of her that was actually sorry for him. “Because I've been married five times,” she told him frankly. “I just don't want to _do_ it again. I don't like being tied down, treated like a servant!”

He was appalled. “I would _never_ treat you that way, Maudie. Never _ever_.”

“Would you be willing to put that in writing?” Ezra asked speculatively.

Maude whipped her head to glare at her son. Oh no! No! She was not pulling _that_  con again. It had taken three years to get that... weasel... to agree to a divorce. And she’d gotten precious little in the bargain. Ezra’s gaze spoke volumes. He didn’t think she had a choice.

“If it meant Maudie would marry me,” Preston said, all eager puppy. “Yes, I would.”

Ezra smacked his palms together. “Wonderful!” _Judas._ “Well, as I will be regrettably detained for the remainder of the day, I suggest you each consider what you would like to include in this agreement, and I shall meet you back here at, say, 5:30? to finalize the contract.”

Preston smiled and Maude resisted the urge to slap the look right off his pathetic face. “I’ll be here, Maudie. Oh, I wouldn’t miss it!”

Ezra took Maude’s arm again and she shrugged out of his grip, shooting him a look of pure venom. “Of course, to ensure that you keep your part of the bargain, I’m afraid you’ll have to remain incarcerated for the time being.”

Maude waited for Preston to leave and turned on her son as he led her back to her cell. “Ezra Standish, you are a sad excuse for a son.”

She shouldn’t have bothered, she saw, as the comment seemed to roll right off his back.

“I need to be in court for Mr. Jackson, Mother,” he told her coldly. “I’ll make sure Mrs. Potter checks in on you.” He turned to leave.

“Well let’s just hope Nathan shows his father more support and loyalty than you’ve shown me.”

She was almost triumphant as he paused, his back to her, his hand on the cell door.

But after a moment, he turned to face her, closing the cell door quietly, and Maude was surprised to find concern in his eyes along with the bitterness.

“Mother, I fear Nathan may need as much support as his father by the time this day is out.”

Maude said not a word as he left. She feared the same thing. And there wasn’t a damn thing anyone would be able to do about it.

> The first six weeks of her time at the “hotel” went by in a haze of anger and depression. The conditions were deplorable. Rats were a common sight and the food was close to inedible. Each room, made to hold two, held six, piled on top of each other in ladder beds with the thinnest of mattresses.
> 
> She was allowed to write letters, but they were often either read by the staff or simply thrown away, never to be delivered. She tried to code a letter to Eilis to let her know that she would be detained longer, but she couldn’t be sure it was received. And she couldn’t be sure Eilis would care. The Standishes thought her an unfit mother at the best of times. This would only prove them right. And trapped in this damn place, there was nothing she could do if they decided to take matters into their own hands and find a way to keep him with them.
> 
> If only so far away from her own family—not that most of them thought much more of her, but blood was blood...
> 
> “Stiles!”
> 
> Maude jumped at the calling of her name. It was mail time—once a week—and she’d never been singled out.
> 
> The prison guard, Miss Greevey, dropped an envelope on Maude’s bed and moved on, not even bothering to look at her. There were some guards who took an interest in the prisoners, but for the most part, Maude and the rest were ignored, or worse. She’d managed to avoid “or worse” so far, by biding her time and keeping her mouth shut. So she said nothing as she carefully opened the letter and read.
> 
>  
> 
> _Mary,_
> 
> _It’s good to hear from you, though I’m sorry your circumstances are so dire as that. The children miss their aunt, of course, but are doing well despite it. Ezra, in particular, has taken to reading all he can get his hands on, dragging Michael and Kate along for the journey._
> 
> _Do let me know if anything changes. It wouldn’t do to keep the children wondering too long, now would it?_
> 
>  
> 
> Maude sat back, smiling a bit. Dear Ezra. He had spent some time with her cousin Cassie and her darling daughter Evalina when he was younger—perhaps three or four, she thought—and Evalina had dragged her younger cousin to school with her where he’d learned his letters. The bright young thing had been reading voraciously ever since.
> 
> Tears came to her eyes all too easily here and she fought them down as she always did. To show weakness in this place would be to fold to it, and Maude never folded if she could bluff instead.
> 
> Ezra was safe. He was doing well from the sound of it. She could get through sixteen and a half more months of this. She could.
> 
> She had to.

“Mrs. Standish?”

The Widow Potter stuck her head in the door, smiling kindly at Maude and reaching for the keys to the cells with one hand, while balancing a tray expertly with the other.

“I thought you’d like a proper lunch, dear.”

Wrapped in memories of a much worse place, Maude found herself feeling grateful for the simple meal of sliced turkey and potatoes. She shook off the feeling with a tight grin to her benefactor. “Thank you, Mrs. Potter,” she said quietly. "I do appreciate the thoughtfulness.” She poured herself tea from the pot provided for her. “Has there been any word on poor Mr. Jackson’s trial?”

“No, not yet—they’re all posturing and talking mostly. That horrible sheriff and his men have insisted that some of them be allowed on the jury so that’s taking a bit of time.” She sniffed. “As if that will afford the poor man a fair trial!”

Maude didn’t bother to enlighten the woman. Obediah would get what he wanted: his day in court to tell his story. He’d get justice through his truth and it wouldn’t matter to him what the jury had to say.

Mrs. Potter smiled at her. “I’m sorry dear—I need to get back to my store. Will you be all right here?”

Maude sighed inwardly. All right, stuck in a box in an empty jail...

“Of course. I’ll be fine,” she assured the other woman, keeping her smile as she watched Mrs. Potter lock the cell and close the jail door behind her.

She could play the game here and show people what they needed to see. It was easier by far than the game she’d played so many years ago.

> “Mary Stiles! You have a visitor!”
> 
> Maude’s palms started sweating. The prison grapevine had been full of the arrest of Jack Nichols and his brother (not quite as loathsome as Jack himself, but a horror and a monster in his own right, Maude thought), and she had been expecting something. What, she didn’t know, but she knew, even eight months after her conviction for Margaret’s death, that the family had to wonder whether she’d really just laid down and taken the punishment due another.
> 
> The walk to the visitors’ room seemed to take an awfully long time, yet it was gone in the blink of an eye as well—especially once she saw Maggie Nichols sitting at a table, prim and proper in her Sunday best.
> 
> “Maggie,” Maude greeted her, trying her best to sound both puzzled and sympathetic. “Why are you here?” She sat across the table from the woman and leaned forward to whisper. “Is it true what they’re saying about Jack? Did they really cart him in?”
> 
> “Aye, they did,” Maggie said, her eyes raking Maude for signs of a con. She’d find none. Eight months in this place had honed Maude’s poker face to something truly impenetrable. “They’re saying he’d been running whoring and selling protection to the local gangs.”
> 
> “Are you okay?” Maude asked, skirting the comment and being as careful as Maggie was being to avoid saying anything out loud that might further the case against Jack. “The boys? Sure, it must be awful for you, love.”
> 
> Maggie’s eyes were as dead as her husband’s and Maude fought a shiver.
> 
> “I didn’t come for your sympathy. Nor for your concern. I only came to say one thing.” She leaned forward over the table, her voice terrifying in its intensity. “If I find you’d anything to do with this, Mary Stiles, I’ll see to it you do nothing else. You hear me?”
> 
> “I swear I didn’t, Maggie!” she whispered, putting all the terror a poor girl from the wrong side of the tracks might feel into every word. “Sure, I’m in here for killing. I’m not allowed anything. How would I’ve had something to do with it?”
> 
> Maggie sat back, but Maude couldn’t be sure she believed her.
> 
> “I’ve had my say,” Maggie stated. “I’m hoping not to have to see you again, Mary Elizabeth.” She rose and nodded to the guard. “I’ll pray for your soul, of course.”
> 
> Maude swallowed a hundred responses she could have made. “Thank you, Maggie.”
> 
> She didn’t take another deep breath until she’d been led back to her room and could sit on her bed and still her shaking.

Maude remembered waking that night with a shocking thought. Larkspur must have known it would take longer than six months to bring Jack in. She never did find out how Maggie ever got wind that she might have had something to do with the case against him, but if she’d’ve been released when she and LaFayette agreed, they'd've hunted her down—probably finding out about Ezra in the process—and she’d likely be dead now at the hands of the Nichols family.

Not that she wasn’t almost killed by the length of her jail stay, anyway…

> Maude had been in jail fifteen months when it started.
> 
> At first, it was thought to be a simple chill, one of many that raced through the overcrowded jail. The first women fell ill midsummer, with chills and fever. They took to their beds and either got better or worse. Sarah Goff was the first to die, in late August.
> 
> She wasn’t the last.
> 
> Crowded conditions and a complete disregard for the prisoners’ health provided a fertile ground for the influenza epidemic that was sweeping across the middle of the country. By the end of September, fifteen of the eighty women held in the “hotel” had died and the majority of the rest were sick.
> 
> Maude fought it as long as she could, but by October she was bedridden, the influenza having caught hold of her lungs and adding pneumonia to her troubles. In her more lucid moments, she’d tried to beg to be allowed to write to her son, but of course, Mary Stiles had no children, so her requests were denied. She was clearly out of her head.
> 
> When she finally came out the other side, frail and unable to even sit up by herself after the lung fever had left her, she had already been moved to the convent in St. Finbar’s, where they sent the prisoners who were certain to die. She had no idea how she’d gotten there, only that the nuns were kinder than anyone she’d seen in far too long.
> 
> “Perhaps you should examine your life,” one of them had told her while sitting vigil with her one night. “God meant for you to survive. He had to have had a purpose.”

Maude snorted. “I do hope _this_  wasn’t your purpose, Lord,” she muttered, wondering when someone was going to come. She wanted to know what was going on with poor Obediah’s trial.

What was God’s purpose _there_ , come to think of it?

Another reason her family’s “deep faith in the almighty” rang so very false for her. If there was a God up there, he’d certainly gotten sidetracked somewhere when it came that poor man, hadn’t he? Michael’d had the right of it. Play the cards you’re dealt and don’t believe in any higher power to save you.

She looked around the jail cell and sighed, sitting heavily and taking up her needlework. All she could do was wait. This foolishness with Preston would have to play out, and she’d dealt with worse, she supposed. She could probably browbeat the pathetic man into a divorce at some point.

But her thoughts kept straying to Obediah Jackson and the look of peace he’d given her as he left this morning, headed for a trial that was certain to end in his death.

Well, death was a kind of peace all its own, wasn’t it?

> It had been seventeen and a half months since Maude had dropped her son off in the Kerry Patch. She could stand for a reasonable length of time now, and walk across the tiny courtyard at the center of the convent. Her clothes had been burned along with those of any of the women who fell as ill as she had, so she wore the simple clothing of a novice, sans cowl.
> 
> She hadn’t seen a prison guard since she awoke and as she gained strength, it began to puzzle her.
> 
> “Sister,” she asked Sister Mary Peter, her almost constant companion these days, as she tottered about and tried to find her legs again. “Have they decided I’m no threat now, seeing as how I can barely walk from one room to another?”
> 
> “I’m sure I don’t understand,” Mary Peter replied, looking suspiciously crafty for a nun. “You aren’t a prisoner here, Maude,” she assured her.
> 
> Maude had frozen at the use of her given name. “What do you mean?”
> 
> Mary Peter smiled kindly at her. “Mary Stiles was given Last Rites three weeks ago, dear. She succumbed to the influenza. It’s fortunate that a brave soul like Maude Standish, one willing to stand up to the more brutish of our neighbors, survived, don’t you think?”
> 
> She’d had to take a seat then, or risk falling.
> 
> “You lied to the jail,” she said in wonder. “Why? Why tell them I’d died?”
> 
> “We didn’t lie,” Mary Peter said quietly. “You truly were very ill. Father Carmody gave you Last Rites on October third, when the doctor assured us you wouldn’t last the night.” She handed Maude a cup with water and gestured for her to drink as she continued. “Mother Superior simply informed the jail that you had been prepared for your death and a place would be provided for your burial among our flock.”
> 
> Maude grinned. “The devil is in—”
> 
> “The _Lord_  is in the details,” Mary Peter quickly corrected.
> 
> “How did you know anything about me?”
> 
> Her companion helped her to stand and started to lead her back to her cell—not the cell she'd feared more a year and more, but the simple room of a novice, with a soft bed and a stove and safety. “I’m afraid I never introduced myself fully,” the nun said. “My name is Sister Mary Peter LaFayette.” She grinned impishly. “Perhaps you know my brother?”
> 
> Maude stopped again. “How did he know?”
> 
> “Jacob has never stopped keep track of you, Mrs. Standish.” She shook her head sadly and urged Maude forward as the convalescent found it increasingly difficult to keep her feet. “He felt so guilty for what happened to you. He even tried to get Larkspur to release you once Mr. Nichols was convicted—”
> 
> “Maggie Nichols would have had me killed,” Maude told her quickly, knowing it was the truth. "She already thought I had something to do with it all. That would have convinced her."
> 
> “Then I expect she’s glad Mary Stiles has gone to her final judgement, isn’t she.”
> 
> Maude sat heavily on the soft mattress in her room and looked out the window at a winter’s day that didn’t seem nearly so dismal as it had before.
> 
> “Sister Mary Peter?” she asked, feeling a lift in her heart that was long overdue. “Could I bother you for some writing supplies? I need to write a letter to my son.”

Maude let out a gusty breath, releasing a tension she hadn’t known she was holding. God, she’d been so pathetically happy to see Ezra when she’d finally recovered enough to make her way to St. Louis. And look at him now.

Her mind conjured up again the look on his face that day—confusion that she’d come back, worry that something had happened to so delay her, anger that she took so long to return, and, muted though it was by the others, happiness that she was with him once again.

Not so unlike the look he’d given her just yesterday, she supposed.

Hell, fine. She’d marry Preston—or find a handier way out of it than getting Ezra in trouble with his judge.

It was always good to have a judge in your corner, after all, wasn’t it?

 

 


End file.
